I picked up the book, which was actually a scroll folded into sections. The papyrus was so brittle, I was afraid to touch it. Hieroglyphs and ill.u.s.trations crowded the page, but I couldn't make sense of them. My ability to read the language seemed to be switched off.

Isis? I asked. A little help?

Her voice was silent. Maybe I'd worn her out. Or maybe she was cross with me for not letting her take over my body, the way Horus had asked Carter to do. Selfish of me, I know.

I closed the book in frustration. "All that work for nothing."

"Now, now," Bast said. "It's not so bad."

"Right," I said. "We're stuck in Washington, D.C. We have two days to make it to Arizona and stop a G.o.d we don't know how to stop. And if we can't, we'll never see our dad or Amos again, and the world might end."

"That's the spirit!" Bast said brightly. "Now, let's have a picnic."

She snapped her fingers. The air shimmered, and a pile of Friskies cans and two jugs of milk appeared on the carpet.

"Um," Carter said, "can you conjure any people food?"

Bast blinked. "Well, no accounting for taste."

The air shimmered again. A plate of grilled cheese sandwiches and crisps appeared, along with a six-pack of c.o.ke.

"Yum," I said.

Carter muttered something under his breath. I suppose grilled cheese wasn't his favorite, but he picked up a sandwich.

"We should leave soon," he said between bites. "I mean...tourists and all."

Bast shook her head. "The Washington Monument closes at six o'clock. The tourists are gone now. We might as well stay the night. If we must travel during the Demon Days, best to do it in daylight hours."

We all must've been exhausted, because we didn't talk again until we'd finished our food. I ate three sandwiches and drank two c.o.kes. Bast made the whole place smell like fish Friskies, then started licking her hand as if preparing for a cat bath.

"Could you not do that?" I asked. "It's disturbing."

"Oh." She smiled. "Sorry."

I closed my eyes and leaned against the wall. It felt good to rest, but I realized the room wasn't actually quiet. The entire building seemed to be humming ever so slightly, sending a tremble through my skull that made my teeth buzz. I opened my eyes and sat up. I could still feel it.

"What is that?" I asked. "The wind?"

"Magic energy," Bast said. "I told you, this is a powerful monument."

"But it's modern. Like the Louvre pyramid. Why is it magic?"

"The Ancient Egyptians were excellent builders, Sadie. They picked shapes-obelisks, pyramids-that were charged with symbolic magic. An obelisk represents a sunbeam frozen in stone-a life-giving ray from the original king of the G.o.ds, Ra. It doesn't matter when the structure was built: it is still Egyptian. That's why any obelisk can be used for opening gates to the Duat, or releasing great beings of power-"

"Or trapping them," I said. "The way you were trapped in Cleopatra's Needle."

Her expression darkened. "I wasn't actually trapped in the obelisk. My prison was a magically created abyss deep in the Duat, and the obelisk was the door your parents used to release me. But, yes. All symbols of Egypt are concentrated nodes of magic power. So an obelisk can definitely be used to imprison G.o.ds."

An idea was nagging at the back of my mind, but I couldn't quite pin it down. Something about my mother, and Cleopatra's Needle, and my father's last promise in the British Museum: I'll put things right.

Then I thought back to the Louvre, and the comment the magician had made. Bast looked so cross at the moment I was almost afraid to ask, but it was the only way I'd get an answer. "The magician said you abandoned your post. What did he mean?"

Carter frowned. "When was this?"

I told him what had happened after Bast chucked him through the portal.

Bast stacked her empty Friskies cans. She didn't look eager to reply.

"When I was imprisoned," she said at last, "I-I wasn't alone. I was locked inside with a...creature of chaos."

"Is that bad?" I asked.

Judging from Bast's expression, the answer was yes. "Magicians often do this-lock a G.o.d up together with a monster so we have no time to try escaping our prison. For eons, I fought this monster. When your parents released me-"

"The monster got out?"

Bast hesitated a little too long for my taste.

"No. My enemy couldn't have escaped." She took a deep breath. "Your mother's final act of magic sealed that gate. The enemy was still inside. But that's what the magician meant. As far as he was concerned, my 'post' was battling that monster forever."

It had the ring of truth, as if she were sharing a painful memory, but it didn't explain the other bit the magician had said: She endangered us all. I was getting up the nerve to ask exactly what the monster had been, when Bast stood up.

"I should go scout," she said abruptly. "I'll be back."

We listened to her footsteps echo down the stairwell.

"She's hiding something," Carter said.

"Work that out yourself, did you?" I asked.

He looked away, and immediately I felt bad.

"I'm sorry," I said. "It's just...what are we going to do?"

"Rescue Dad. What else can we do?" He picked up his wand and turned it in his fingers. "Do you think he really meant to...you know, bring Mom back?"

I wanted to say yes. More than anything, I wanted to believe that was possible. But I found myself shaking my head. Something about it didn't seem right. "Iskandar told me something about Mum," I said. "She was a diviner. She could see the future. He said she made him rethink some old ideas."

It was my first chance to tell Carter about my conversation with the old magician, so I gave him the details.

Carter knit his eyebrows. "You think that has something to do with why Mom died-she saw something in the future?"

"I don't know." I tried to think back to when I was six, but my memory was frustratingly fuzzy. "When they took us to England the last time, did she and Dad seemed like they were in a hurry-like they were doing something really important?"

"Definitely."

"Would you say freeing Bast was really important? I mean-I love her, of course-but worth dying for important?"

Carter hesitated. "Probably not."

"Well, there you are. I think Dad and Mum were up to something bigger, something they didn't complete. Possibly that's what Dad was after at the British Museum-completing the task, whatever it was. Making things right. And this whole business about our family going back a billion years to some G.o.d-hosting pharaohs-why didn't anyone tell us? Why didn't Dad?"

Carter didn't answer for a long time.

"Maybe Dad was protecting us," he said. "The House of Life doesn't trust our family, especially after what Dad and Mom did. Amos said we were raised apart for a reason, so we wouldn't, like, trigger each other's magic."

"b.l.o.o.d.y awful reason to keep us apart," I muttered.

Carter looked at me strangely, and I realized what I'd said might have been construed as a compliment.

"I just mean they should've been honest," I rushed on. "Not that I wanted more time with my annoying brother, of course."

He nodded seriously. "Of course."

We sat listening to the magic hum of the obelisk. I tried to remember the last time Carter and I had simply spent time like this together, talking.

"Is your, um..." I tapped the side of my head. "Your friend being any help?"

"Not much," he admitted. "Yours?"

I shook my head. "Carter, are you scared?"

"A little." He dug his wand into the carpet. "No, a lot."

I looked at the blue book we'd stolen-pages full of wonderful secrets I couldn't read. "What if we can't do it?"

"I don't know," he said. "That book about mastering the element of cheese would've been more helpful."

"Or summoning fruit bats."

"Please, not the fruit bats."

We shared a weary smile, and it felt rather good. But it changed nothing. We were still in serious trouble with no clear plan.

"Why don't you sleep on it?" he suggested. "You used a lot of energy today. I'll keep watch until Bast gets back."

He actually sounded concerned for me. How cute.

I didn't want to sleep. I didn't want to miss anything. But I realized my eyelids were incredibly heavy.

"All right, then," I said. "Don't let the bedbugs bite."

I lay down to sleep, but my soul-my ba-had other ideas.

S A D I E.

20. I Visit the Star-Spangled G.o.ddess.

I HADN'T REALIZED HOW UNSETTLING it would be. Carter had explained how his ba left his body while he slept, but having it happen to me was another thing altogether. It was much worse than my vision in the Hall of Ages. it would be. Carter had explained how his ba left his body while he slept, but having it happen to me was another thing altogether. It was much worse than my vision in the Hall of Ages.

There I was, floating in the air as a glowing birdlike spirit. And there was my body below me, fast asleep. Just trying to describe it gives me a headache.

My first thought as I gazed down on my sleeping form: G.o.d, I look awful. Bad enough looking in a mirror or seeing pictures of myself on my friends' Web pages. Seeing myself in person was simply wrong. My hair was a rat's nest, the linen pajamas were not in the least flattering, and the spot on my chin was enormous.

My second thought as I examined the strange shimmering form of my ba: This won't do at all. I didn't care if I was invisible to the mortal eye or not. After my bad experience as a kite, I simply refused to go about as a glowing Sadie-headed chicken. That's fine for Carter, but I have standards.

I could feel the currents of the Duat tugging at me, trying to pull my ba to wherever souls go when they have visions, but I wasn't ready. I concentrated hard, and imagined my normal appearance (well, all right, perhaps my appearance as I'd like it to be, a bit better than normal). And voila, my ba morphed into a human form, still see-through and glowing, mind you, but more like a proper ghost.

Well, at least that's sorted, I thought. And I allowed the currents to sweep me away. The world melted to black.

At first, I was nowhere-just a dark void. Then a young man stepped out of the shadows.

"You again," he said.

I stammered. "Uh..."

Honestly, you know me well enough by now. That's not like me. But this was the boy I'd seen in my Hall of Ages vision-the very handsome boy with the black robes and tousled hair. His dark brown eyes had the most unnerving effect on me, and I was very glad I'd changed out of my glowing chicken outfit.

I tried again, and managed three entire words. "What are you..."

"Doing here?" he said, gallantly finishing my sentence. "Spirit travel and death are very similar."

"Not sure what that means," I said. "Should I be worried?"

He tilted his head as if considering the question. "Not this trip. She only wants to talk to you. Go ahead."

He waved his hand and a doorway opened in the darkness. I was pulled towards it.

"See you again?" I asked.

But the boy was gone.

I found myself standing in a luxury flat in the middle of the sky. It had no walls, no ceiling, and a see-through floor looking straight down at city lights from the height of an airplane. Clouds drifted below my feet. The air should've been freezing cold and too thin to breathe, but I felt warm and comfortable.

Black leather sofas made a U round a gla.s.s coffee table on a blood-red rug. A fire burned in a slate fireplace. Bookshelves and paintings hovered in the air where the walls should've been. A black granite bar stood in the corner, and in the shadows behind it, a woman was making tea.

"h.e.l.lo, my child," she said.

She stepped into the light, and I gasped. She wore an Egyptian kilt from the waist down. From the waist up, she wore only a bikini top, and her skin...her skin was dark blue, covered with stars. I don't mean painted stars. She had the entire cosmos living on her skin: gleaming constellations, galaxies too bright to look at, glowing nebulae of pink and blue dust. Her features seemed to disappear into the stars that shifted across her face. Her hair was long and as black as midnight.

"You're the Nut," I said. Then I realized maybe that had come out wrong. "I mean...the sky G.o.ddess."

The G.o.ddess smiled. Her bright white teeth were like a new galaxy bursting into existence. "Nut is fine. And believe me, I've heard all the jokes about my name."